Friday, April 25, 2014

Larry Jacobs wrote (ICO, 4/25/14) that I “perhaps was
hitting the bong” when I wrote that pot growing uses as much water on one day
as fracking does in a year. Mr. Jacobs then went on to “prove” I was wrong by stating
that each marijuana plant absorbs less than a gallon a day, and projected that
would necessitate 200 million pot plants, “over six pounds for every man,
woman, and child in California.”

Larry, you chide me that I “can’t just throw figures out
there and think no one is going to check on them…” However, if you had gone to
the link I provided in my letter: “Marijuana’s thirst depleting North Coast
watersheds“, Press Democrat, April 12, 2014, you’d have found
that my information came from marijuana experts in the Press Democrat article I
cited. Yes, Larry, from the Press Democrat: “Researchers estimate each plant
consumes 6 gallons of water a day.” “But Tim Blake, founder of the North
Coast's Emerald Cup cannabis competition, said mature, tree-sized plants need closer
to 15 gallons a day.”

Larry, I have no idea where you came up with your “less than
a gallon a day”, but it’s not credible.

Expert researchers’ numbers indicate California eradicated 4
million plants last year, or 10% of a total 40 million plants grown. On that
basis, 36 million pounds of marijuana (one pound per plant) was marketed. Of
that, 67% was smuggled out of California, leaving about 12 million pounds for
38 million Californians, or 5.1 ounces/person.

Besides the Press Democrat source, I found supporting information in two Mother Jones articles here and here on damages of illegal pot growing.

Larry, your six pounds per Californian number must have come
from the same place you got your less than a gallon of water a day. Your
numbers don’t hold water.

The following are my source articles for this post. You can go to the source article by clicking on the link as indicated.

24 Mind-Blowing Facts About Marijuana Production in America (go to link

“Essentially, marijuana can consume all the water. Every bit
of it,” said state Fish and Wildlife Senior Environmental Scientist Scott
Bauer, who specializes in salmon recovery and is working on a study of the
issue.

The findings, expected to be released soon, shed new light
on a massive, largely unregulated industry in California that has been blamed
for polluting streams and forests with pesticides and trash and for bulldozing
trees and earth to make clearings for gardens.

“The destruction of habitat is actually quite staggering,”
said Patrick Foy, a spokesman with the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Last year, 24 North Coast salmon-bearing tributaries were
reported to have gone dry, Bauer said, though not all were verified by the
agency.

Even without drought, there isn't going to be enough water
to meet the pot industry's growing demand, Bauer said.

Just the illegal marijuana plants confiscated in California
by law enforcement in recent years — between 2 million and 4 million annually —
use upward of 1.8 billion gallons — or about 600,000 water tanker trucks over
their five-month growing season, based on the average water usage documented in
the study.

That amount is enough to stanch the seasonal flow of many
small creeks in the region, potentially stranding the young salmon and
steelhead that decades of taxpayer-funded efforts have sought to restore.

“It's really an important issue for fish,” Bauer said.
“We've invested a lot of money in these salmon and steelhead stock.”

The North Coast sits at the center of the escalating
environmental crisis. Its remote forests and seemingly ample water supplies
have long made the region famed territory for West Coast pot cultivation,
earning three counties — Mendocino, Humboldt and Trinity — the much-trumpeted
“Emerald Triangle” moniker.

That notoriety is now marked, however, by the signs of
widespread environmental degradation, endangering the region's clear,
free-running streams and the wildlife that depends on them.

“I think it's really important that this industry, which has
brought so much wealth to our communities and the region, take responsibility
for its impacts,” said Scott Greacen, executive director of Friends of the Eel
River.

The state study Bauer led examined three watersheds in
Humboldt County and one in Mendocino County, all of them renowned for marijuana
cultivation. They include two near Redway, one near Orick and one that includes
Willits.

The Redwood Creek watershed near Orick drains into the
ocean. The other three watersheds feed the Eel River.

Using satellite images, researchers determined that an
average of 30,000 plants were growing in each of the four watersheds in 2012,
an increase since 2009 of 75 percent to 100 percent, Bauer said.

“We were able to count every plant and measure every
greenhouse,” Bauer said. The pot gardens they found ranged in size from 10
plants to hundreds, he said.

The greenhouse-plant counts are estimates, based on the size
of the structures.

Researchers estimate each plant consumes 6 gallons of water
a day. At that rate, the plants were siphoning off 180,000 gallons of water per
day in each watershed — altogether more than 160 Olympic-sized swimming pools
over the average 150-day growing cycle for outdoor plants.

“We're still fairly shocked,” by the results, Bauer said.

Some marijuana advocates have taken issue with the
6-gallon-per-plant estimate, saying daily water use is considerably less. But
Tim Blake, founder of the North Coast's Emerald Cup cannabis competition, said
mature, tree-sized plants need closer to 15 gallons a day.

Plants grown in inland Mendocino County, where it's hot in
the summer, will use more water, while those in cooler regions can use less,
Blake said. He estimates it takes 60,000 gallons to 75,000 gallons to raise 25
plants, the current limit for medicinal marijuana in Mendocino County.

Sheriff Tom Allman has estimated there are more than 1
million marijuana plants being illegally grown annually just in Mendocino
County. That doesn't include medical marijuana gardens.

Water and wildlife officials don't base their investigations
on whether the marijuana being grown is for medical purposes. Instead, they
look at the violation of laws meant to protect natural resources, including
forests, soil and streams.

“If the operator is not in compliance with environmental
laws, then they're not legal. That's the way I look at it,” said Stormer Feiler,
an environmental scientist with the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control
Board.

The new study escalates scrutiny of North Coast pot
cultivation and is likely to inflame a debate that has raged for years among
supporters and foes of marijuana farms. The issue has even split growers in the
industry, which has an annual estimated value that varies widely, from $10
billion to over $120 billion.

Until now, few official statistics have been available to
inform the water-use discussion about marijuana. That is unlike the attention
on other land-intensive industries, including the North Coast's famed wine
crop, where water use has been documented and watched for years.

But with logging activity on the decline across much of the
region and a thriving black market for pot — plus state-sanctioned recreational
marijuana sales in Washington and Colorado — the spread of cannabis cultivation
is now seen by many environmentalists and government scientists as the greatest
threat to forests and streams damaged by decades of heavy human use.

“There's no real question the marijuana industry is now the
biggest single sector in terms of our concerns,” said Greacen, Friends of the
Eel River director.

He said regulating the industry and its water use would go a
long way toward fixing the problem.

If growers collected all their water during the rainy season
and stored it in permitted tanks or ponds — like many other farmers —
marijuana's water consumption would not be such an issue, Greacen said.

Blake, the Emerald Cup founder, agreed. He said most locally
based growers are conscientious, both about staying within plant limits and
using their own springs or buying tanks of water. But there are others who buy,
rent or trespass on water-short properties and then divert water illegally to
grow their crops, he said. Law enforcement officials say such growers also tap
into neighbors' springs and water tanks.

“It's the big commercial growers that are giving all the
people who have been doing a good job up here a bad name,” Blake said.

Dale Gieringer, state coordinator of the National
Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, a group that advocates for
marijuana legalization, said growers are taking too much of the blame for the
state's water woes.

“I don't think marijuana is responsible for most of the
water problems in California,” he said. But, if the marijuana plant counts
cited in the study are correct, “that could have an impact” in those
watersheds, he acknowledged.

Wildlife officials are quick to say that many local
marijuana growers are following the rules.

But there are quite a few who don't.

Fish and Wildlife officials last year investigated 264
marijuana-growing operations in the state and helped remove 129 illegal dams
being used to irrigate pot, said Capt. Nathaniel Arnold, who runs the
department's statewide marijuana team.

Of those operations, about 70 were in Lake and Mendocino
counties, he said.

Agency officials say they are limited in what they can
accomplish because they are outnumbered by marijuana-growing offenders.

“We just don't have enough staff” to investigate every
complaint, Feiler said.

The cases often take years to investigate and prosecute.

State regulators recently worked on three cases, each
involving an unauthorized dam on one tributary to the Navarro River in
Comptche, west of Ukiah.

Another case involves a Willits-area property rented to
marijuana growers who used bulldozers to clear several acres of forest.

On Friday, the Oakland landowner, Joung Min Yi, reached a
settlement with the state that requires him to pay $56,404 in penalties for
state and federal water code violations.

He also is required to restore the land, work that has
reportedly cost more than $80,000, Feiler said.

Most cases pursued by water regulators are resolved through
civil fines rather than criminal charges, in part because it requires fewer
resources, he said.

Marijuana growers aren't the only ones taking water without
permission. Last year, a Mendocino County vineyard was fined $33,800 for
diverting water from an unnamed creek into its irrigation reservoir.

Legislators have proposed stronger environmental protection
measures in response to the problem. Pending state legislation would boost
funding for water and wildlife investigations connected to illegal marijuana
cultivation.

In Mendocino County, Sheriff Allman has initiated a water
theft hotline and said cases are being being vigorously prosecuted. The
District Attorney's Office does not have statistics available on water
prosecutions, spokesman Mike Geniella said.

The Department of Fish and Wildlife has put together a team
dedicated to dealing with marijuana, Foy said. Water and wildlife officials
also are asking marijuana growers to learn and follow water regulations. The
State Water Resources Control Board website has information about obtaining
permits to collect and store water.

The permits and requirements apply to any site preparation
work, “regardless of crop,” the state website notes.

Still, regulators and environmentalists are concerned that
the explosion of marijuana in the region, without greater controls, will ruin
the landscape for everyone.

Friday, April 18, 2014

Cherry pickers like John Wiesner
(ICO, April 18) shouldn’t accuse others of cherry picking (good cherry-picking
article: http://tinyurl.com/m2uxfys). Previously I wrote that San Francisco has
the longest tide gauge record in the Western Hemisphere (link to three ICO letters) in
which I analyzed San Francisco tide gauge information). In 158 years sea level
at San Francisco rose only107 millimeters (4.2”) or 2.7” per century, a tiny rate
of increase that somehow impressed Mr. Wiesner. However, at that rate it takes
over 22 centuries, not 86 years, to reach “expert” predictions of 5’ by 2100. Only
129 years ago, the 1884 San Francisco sea level was only 1.8” lower than 2013.

Mr. Wiesner noted that San
Francisco’s sea level in 1941 was unusually high, but omitted that it was
higher than 2013 twenty-one times, including 1941, 1956, 1969, 1983, and 1997. He
also missed my key point that sea level fell since 1997 in San Francisco, San
Diego, Los Angeles, and Seattle, when all the “experts” agree it must rise at
an accelerating rate to increase 5’ by 2100.

Researching his cherry-picking
comments inspired me to expand my study by adding Victoria and Vancouver in
Canada. I found that all six cities I studied had higher sea levels in both
1983 and 1997(1983 was higher than 1997 for four), and that half had higher
1941 sea levels, than in 2013.

Mr. Wiesner began by praising me
for providing a link to my source, but ended by asking if I thought no one
would check my assertions. Only a liberal could be so illogical. Why would I
provide a link to my data, and think no one would use it? I invited its use.

Here it is again: link to tide gauge data.
Please use it and challenge your beliefs. You could dispel embarrassing ignorance.

Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Ignorance is a strong foundation to build a belief system
on, and human-caused climate change is the best example extant. I’m frequently
confronted with statements that anthropogenic global warming, climate change,
or now its latest incarnation, weather “weirding”, are responsible for such
things as droughts, sea levels rising, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, vanishing
snow, retreating glaciers, civil war in Syria, deforestation in Indonesia, and
loss of the Kilimanjaro ice cap.

My answer is always that climate change is natural, and that
our current modest warming is a natural recovery from the Little Ice Age (1400-1850AD), the coldest
period during the past 10,000 years. I explain that there have been five
warming periods in the past 10,000 years since the end of the Ice Age. I name
the periods chronologically, beginning with the Holocene Optimum 8,000 to 5,000
years ago, the Minoan, Roman, Medieval (900 to 1400AD), and finally our current
warm period. I point out that each warm period does not get as warm as its
predecessor, and that the warm period we are experiencing now is the least warm
by far.

Then I throw in the Eemian warm period 125,000 years ago,
and note that it was much warmer than any of the Holocene, our current warm
period. By then I can see total incomprehension, so I don’t explain that the
past million years have a pattern of 100,000-year cold (glacial) periods
alternating with 20,000-year warm (interglacial) periods. The bottom line is
that I have just given a brief lesson in natural climate change, and that the
concept that climate is always changing, and often is much warmer than now, is
met by dumb disbelief by my audience. “That’s not what Al Gore said!”

So then I make it simple. I show a chart of temperature in a
local city, Santa Rosa, California (below). Temperature in Santa Rosa peaked in
the 1930’s, and there has been a cooling trend since.

Since these temperature records are from the U. S.
government National Climatic Data Center of the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration, I can’t be accused of oil company propaganda.

This is the Santa Rosa chart after it was recently "homogenized". The strong cooling trend of the originally recorded data has now become warming - the early 1900's are over one degree Celsius lower, and recent temperature are about half a degree higher.

Here is Ukiah, before and after homogenization. Again, a century-long cooling trend becomes warming.

Ukiah before homogenization:

Ukiah after homogenization:

They might say, so what, that’s only one city, and the Earth
is overheating. Obviously they haven’t comprehended what I illustrated
concerning natural climate change in the past 10,000 years, and the past
million years. So then I show them a chart showing there has been no
significant global warming for almost 18 years, a period where the rate of
increase of atmospheric CO2 has doubled.

None of the climate models show that a
huge increase in atmospheric CO2 does not increase warming for almost 18 years.
Just the opposite. The climate models show warming accelerating, yet at this
point measured temperature is below the lowest climate model projections. In
science studies, when models don’t agree with reality, the models get thrown
out. Since the UN still goes with the models instead of reality, that shows
that science is not what the UN is trying to accomplish.

How about sea levels rising. Tide gauge records for the four
largest cities on the U. S. West Coast – San Diego, Las Angeles, San Francisco,
and Seattle – show that current sea level for each of them is about the same as in
1941, and that all have experienced falling sea level since 1983.

.

Do you see any sign of sea level acceleration in this San Francisco tide gauge record? Sea level was two inches higher at San Francisco in 1983 than in 2016, and the rate of rise is less than five inches per century. The "experts" predict sea level will rise five feet by 2100, but at the current rate sea level will not reach a five-foot increase until 3300 AD. Just in time for the next glacial period (Ice Age).

Droughts? Fewer and less severe than before 1950.

Hurricanes? Glad you asked. Fewer powerful ones, and the
longest period since the Civil War that no strong hurricane has hit the U. S.

Tornadoes. Also fewer strong ones.

Floods? Besides the fact that floods should not have
anything with global warming, there has been no trend in increasing weather-related losses.

Snow? No trend of less snow.

Glacier retreat? Glaciers have been retreating since the end
of the Little Ice Age, and for many glaciers, they retreated far more before
1900 than after. Seen Chasing Ice, by
James Balog? James does not inform his viewers that the glacier he videoed in
Greenland retreated 18 miles from 1851 to 1964, stopped retreating until 2001 while
atmospheric CO2 increased steadily and dramatically, and has retreated an
additional six miles since (during a period of no significant global warming).

Wildfires? The trend is going down.

It is amazing how small an effect facts have on beliefs, such as the anthropogenic global warming/climate change religion. It should be so simple to end it. CO2 is going way up, but temperature isn't, and the climate now is nowhere as warm as previously naturally.